Time Out
by jillyred
Summary: What if we were born knowing when we will meet our soul mate, and when that clock slowly begins to count down, what would you do in order to make sure that you'll stay with them forever? Arthur Kirkland only has to wait seventeen years until his soul mate is to appear to him, but, is he ready for what may lay in store?


Time Out

Everyone was born with numbers across their chest, right where their heart is supposed to be sometimes the numbers are long and will last most of their life, others are considerably shorter. When I was born mine said sixteen years, three months, four days 2 hours seventeen minutes and 35 seconds, to be exact, however apparently it had been counting down since it was formed while I was in the womb. About was six months into my gestation period my clock was formed and started to count down, seconds and minutes trailing away until the very moment when I would meet my soul mate. As I grew it was all I spoke of with my friends, when we would meet that one special person, what they would be like would they be the one we would fall in love with, or the best friend we would ever have? So many of these thoughts and ideas would circle through us, we were rosy cheeked hopeful young children, all waiting for that person to appear.

It was in my fourth year at school when our dreams about this person came crashing down on all of us, when we realised this doesn't mean _forever. _A small blonde boy with lonely eyes was transferred into our class, he was timid and his eyes rarely left the floor that he seemed lost in. I was attracted to his fair hair and faraway eyes; he moved with a shivering shuffle to the middle of the classroom and was seated next to an annoying French frog call Francis Bonnefoy, my arch-nemesis. I watched him for a little while and when he finally looked my way he jumped a little when he noticed me staring, I smiled and waved at him and he gave a shy smile back to me. I took it to believe a bond had formed between us, so when break-time started I walked over to him and held out my hand.

"I'm Arthur Kirkland, do you want to share my tuc' money?" I asked him in my most polite voice so as to not scare him, and he looked at me but nodded soon. I grinned and took his hand and dragged him to the tuck table, the dinner ladies were serving a few kids a head of us and I turned to the new boy. "So what's your name?"

"Ma-Matthew Williams" He said it so softly that I had to lean closer just to hear it but then I smiled at him glad he would share it with me.

"I think that's a good name," I told him with a puffed out chest. "Just like Arthur, that's 'cause I am a proper gentleman, so you can be too!" I add with some enthusiasm, no one really wanted to be a gentleman like me, I didn't know why. Not many people were very fond of me at all, either way, Matthew nodded. I rushed forwards and we picked our snacks before we wandered out onto the playground where we sat together to eat and I finally asked him the question that was on the tip of my tongue. "So, how long have you got left?"

Matthew looked at me with such a sad look that I immediately regretted it, his face told of something horrific that I wasn't sure I wanted to know, he looked so, lost. He then wiped at his face, and I realised that he was starting to cry; I rested my hand on his shoulder and made him look at me again. "What's wrong?"

Matthew undid his school blazer and the first few buttons on his shirt to show me the marks on his chest, there was just a small flashing zero, I gasped and fell away from him in complete shock. I could barely say anything as I sat there, he had no time on his clock, but that didn't make any sense. "I-I don't understand" I asked him confused; I don't think I had ever seen something like this before. Matthew looked up at me and spoke in such soft words, ones that spoke of knowing understanding and complete resignation.

"I know it looks bad, but I'm not the only one. My mother told me that there are so many people who are born with either no time, or hardly any, they say it means I will never meet them. Or I don't have a soul mate at all, that in all the people in this universe there is not match for me" He looked at me with a sad smile and a shudder rattled through my bones. "I just think that they are in another life, waiting for me too. Maybe this zero doesn't mean never, but it is infinite. And someday, I'll meet them, in this life or the next" He then took my hand and rested it on his beating chest; it was fast and fluttered beneath my hand. "I'm still alive and content as I can be with all I have"

The words he spoke were so powerful and so perfect for one that was so young, it was as though of all his ten years he had been practicing just what to say, or maybe, they were words he used to reassure himself. I took my hand back and swallowed the lump in my dry throat before letting my hand rest on my chest. I had seven years left, seven fleeting years until I met my soul mate, but, how long would we have?

Based on post/ 3139087743/ timer- 2009-if-a -clock-could-count -down-to-the this, I was bored. It'll be a few small drabbles.


End file.
